What is your take on no-knock search warrants?

Question by Tea Party: What is your take on no-knock search warrants?
Is this practice constitutional, and should it be allowed for common searches? I can understand hostage or other emergency situations, which is why these searches were first allowed. Police are now abusing the system just to look for some marijuana. I’ve talked to police friends about this, and also one who is a magistrate. Police claim that they need the element of surprise so those inside the house won’t have time to get rid of the evidence.

If the evidence is so small that they can flush it down the toilet in a matter of 3 minutes or so, is it worth breaking down the door and putting the police and the occupants in danger? Is it really worth people getting killed? Both police and occupants have been killed during these raids. And sometimes the occupants who were killed were innocent. These raids have gone wrong and police had the wrong house or got their information from informants who weren’t reliable. One case is the elderly lady in Atlanta who was killed in 2006. There’s many more examples, but I won’t elaborate.

Personally, I’m a law abiding citizen and have never had my house searched. I have nothing to hide. But if I’m awakened when my door is busted down at 3AM and a bunch of screaming idiots come rushing in, there’s no telling what I will do. What would you do if your door is busted in and there’s a gun nearby? Just because they are screaming “POLICE” doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what they really are.

I hope the judicial system wakes up and one day puts an end to this senseless practice. What’s your thoughts?

Best answer:

Answer by Sart BimpsonIt depends on what the person is wanted for. If the warrant is to arch a sex offender or something fine.

Drugs, no. Drugs should be legal anyway. The drug laws are unconstitutional so the police shouldnt enforce these laws.

3 thoughts on “What is your take on no-knock search warrants?”

For those of you that have read about the causative factors behind the American Revolution, this is very interesting.
Recall that British troops (in the American colonies) used to conduct warrant-less searches of people’s homes. This was done “to ensure public safety”, or so they said. Needless to say, our founding fathers and many perceptive early Americans could see through this false pretense. The disgust and anger caused by these warrant-less searches was one of many factors that contributed to the Revolution.
Notice how similarly-sounding the excuses given today are.”We’re just looking for criminals, nothing to worry about if you’re innocent”. “Police state? It could never happen here”.

OK Mr Troll I have been in LE for over 20 years, and on SWAT over 16 years, and only participated in two no knock warrants. One was a hostage rescue, and one was a dude manufacturing bombs he was using against people he didn’t like. The move across the nation is to move away from dynamic entry completely, so the claim that officers are using no knock warrants even more now, and especially on marijuana cases shows how stupid, immature, and troll like you really are. Thanks and have a nice day